Snow Plowing Forum banner

Community Feedback: New Forum Software Is Live!

21330 Views 601 Replies 23 Participants Last post by  Mike_PS
7
We are excited to announce that we are live on our new forum platform!

It’s been a long time coming. Let’s face it. Sometimes older forum technology lags behind other parts of the internet. Although seeing the same format for a long time is comforting, the member experience shouldn’t include dealing with outdated, unsafe, slow software.

The transition to a new platform will never be 100% smooth but the days of dealing with out of date forum software are over. We have teams dedicated to building a world-class community for you. The development has been steady with regular software releases since May 2019. Asking members for feedback and coming up with ideas for improvement is what we want.

Speed and Reliability Are Key
No one should have to wait for information. This site has been built to be much faster and more reliable, period.

New Homepage Experience
Our algorithm will serve a personal customized feed based on your prior engagement with content on the site. If you’ve liked and or commented, or are following certain topics that are of interest to you, similar content will appear at the top of the homepage.

Search
We have introduced new search algorithms, powered by an industry-leading AI platform, to help you find information faster. We plan to roll out new features to continue improving search, and to power many additional areas of the forum.

Due to the volume of content, our search platform may take some time to complete indexing over the first few days after migrating. During this process, you may see a limited number of posts until indexing has been completed. We appreciate your patience.

Finding Your Way Around
We have made the design clean and simple to use. Near the upper right-hand corner of the community, you will see navigation icons.

The first icon is for what’s new on the site.

Clicking on it, by default, will take you to new unread posts. On that page, you can click on additional tabs as well, such as Popular, if you prefer to view active topics.

Clicking the list icon next to “NEW” will bring you to the full forum listing.

Clicking your avatar will give you a drop-down menu for all things related to your account.

You can also navigate more by clicking the 3 vertical dots.

Dark Mode
We have introduced Dark Mode. One of our favorite features allows you to access the site with a power-saving, and easier on the eyes dark mode. You can access it in the drop-down menu under the 3 vertical dots.

Save Bookmarks
Now you can save your favorite discussion threads and posts! Bookmarks are a handy way to remember and easily find great content or stuff you want to read later.

We also wanted to make it easier for new users to understand the lingo of forums. We have cleaned up various language to more commonly recognized phrases including:
  • Following - Thread subscriptions, and Watched are now known as Following
  • Conversations - Private Messages or PMs are now conversations and can be accessed from the user avatar drop-down in the main navigation
  • Showcase - Showcase is designed for users to "showcase" items/projects through the use of uploaded images, text descriptions and custom content categories. It’s a way to visually and textually provide detailed information on the content you wish to share. The showcase would be similar to a catalog, whereas the gallery would be like a photo album. It can be accessed from the drop-down menu with the 3 dots.
Take a tour and look around! Check out the Help section for some quick FAQs about the new platform.

Please keep all feedback, questions, concerns, requests for help, etc. regarding the new platform right here in this Feedback thread. This will help us make sure not to miss a request for help and also let us pass along your thoughts to our Product team. The Admins and I will be here to help along the way taking note of your comments.

- Community Management Team
See less See more
Status
Not open for further replies.
421 - 440 of 602 Posts
Again, I think it is a slight contrast issue more than user error in this case.

The alerts show 3 different color/shades:
  • Old Alerts - Gray
  • New Unread since last login - Slightly darker gray (this is the contrast issue)
  • New Read since last login - White/Black (light or dark mode).
When you are going to the alerts page, it will display the number of "new unread" alerts. If you refresh once on this page, they will update to "new read" and the contrast will be clearer. Currently the contrast between "old" and "new unread" is very similar and hard to distinguish. The reason some will show as gray and others not on the 'new' list is usually that you viewed the item either by going directly to it (opening the thread) or were already on that page when the alert was added to the page.

Daniel
Huh, interesting... What device/browser are you using?

I just tried switching to dark mode again and this is my alerts:

View attachment 251120

Everything save for the top 3 are supposedly unread. Clicking on the 25m ago one and returning still leaves it "unread." And in half an hour, all of them will be gray again. But yours seems to be working correctly. Guess it is user error after all.....

Edit: 5 minutes later and two have reverted to "unread"

View attachment 251121
My portable PC.....

Automotive design Computer cluster Gas Technology Gadget
See less See more
  • Haha
  • Wow
Reactions: 2
Again, I think it is a slight contrast issue more than user error in this case.

The alerts show 3 different color/shades:
  • Old Alerts - Gray
  • New Unread since last login - Slightly darker gray (this is the contrast issue)
  • New Read since last login - White/Black (light or dark mode).
When you are going to the alerts page, it will display the number of "new unread" alerts. If you refresh once on this page, they will update to "new read" and the contrast will be clearer. Currently the contrast between "old" and "new unread" is very similar and hard to distinguish. The reason some will show as gray and others not on the 'new' list is usually that you viewed the item either by going directly to it (opening the thread) or were already on that page when the alert was added to the page.

Daniel
K. But why are the alerts changing colors after 20ish minutes on their own on my system, but not on @BUFF's? I can clearly see the difference in colors between the photo he posted and what I posted. Why aren't his old read alerts showing up the same as mine?
  • Like
Reactions: 1
Figures. IBM = MP money.

BRB, gonna see if I can upgrade my TracFone.
  • Haha
Reactions: 2
2
Here is a screenshot of the "New unread" next to "old" (in light mode). 2 are the slightly darker gray and the rest are the normal gray.

Rectangle Font Parallel Screenshot Number


Refreshing the page however makes the contrast much clearer to see:
Rectangle Font Parallel Screenshot Technology


Overall, I can understand that this isn't very clear or easy to see. That is why we are hoping to work on this feature and improve it down the line. However, at the moment I do not have a timeframe on when that will be improved.

Daniel
See less See more
Here is a screenshot of the "New unread" next to "old" (in light mode). 2 are the slightly darker gray and the rest are the normal gray.

View attachment 251123

Refreshing the page however makes the contrast much clearer to see:
View attachment 251124

Overall, I can understand that this isn't very clear or easy to see. That is why we are hoping to work on this feature and improve it down the line. However, at the moment I do not have a timeframe on when that will be improved.

Daniel
Since color/colour coding doesn't seem to work for the needy...... Might I suggest animal figures.... Say for unread a horses head is used and for read/red a horses arse is used
  • Love
  • Haha
  • Wow
Reactions: 3
Since color/colour coding doesn't seem to work for the needy...... Might I suggest animal figures.... Say for unread a horses head is used and for read/red a horses arse is used
You forgot the dead, beaten horse with the flies above it for the "old, read"
  • Haha
Reactions: 2
Alright, I think I'm finally figuring this out.

So:
Rectangle Font Parallel Screenshot Number


While I think I get it, I still don't follow why @BUFF's photo does not seem to show the same colors/changes as the rest of us. His "old, read" are not shaded at all. Unless I'm just missing it.
See less See more
  • Like
Reactions: 1
Alright, I think I'm finally figuring this out.

So:
View attachment 251125

While I think I get it, I still don't follow why @BUFF's photo does not seem to show the same colors/changes as the rest of us. His "old, read" are not shaded at all. Unless I'm just missing it.
Remember saying IBM Sooperpuker = MP Money....
  • Like
Reactions: 1
Went to post a pic.
after it up loaded I wanted to delete
It
Sew… I hit delete and I get this message
Communication Device Gadget Font Mobile device Screenshot
See less See more
  • Haha
Reactions: 1
Went to post a pic.
after it up loaded I wanted to delete
It
Sew… I hit delete and I get this message
View attachment 251134
I think you have to spring for the Premium Membership to have that much power
  • Like
Reactions: 1
Went to post a pic.
after it up loaded I wanted to delete
It
Sew… I hit delete and I get this message
View attachment 251134
This is a known bug and we are already working on a fix. It should be rolling out with one of the next updates. In the meantime, the work around is to make the post, then edit it and you can remove the photo.

I know that isn't ideal, but hopefully the fix will take care of it soon enough.

If you are still not able to remove the photo for any reason, please self-report the post and include a note asking for the attached photo to be removed. The moderators will be able to remove the photo for you in that case.

Daniel
Went to post a pic.
after it up loaded I wanted to delete
It
Sew… I hit delete and I get this message
View attachment 251134
Well, maybe in 15 minutes it will delete itself.

Or maybe it's just a different shade of gray/white/black/taupe/salmon/fuschia and you just can't see the difference.
  • Like
  • Haha
Reactions: 2
I think you have to spring for the Premium Membership to have that much power
That's MP money
  • Haha
Reactions: 2
maybe it's just a different shade of lavender and you just can't see the difference.
Agreed.
  • Haha
  • Like
Reactions: 3
I know some of you were talking about the quoting multiple lines in a reply.
such as
Below.
I submitted a feature request on the Moderator forum, where all the super moderators hang out and we’re all premium members, I’ll update y’all on what happens.
Product Mobile device Communication Device Portable communications device Font
See less See more
When posting a pic
, you can see the pic in your post
Yet you still have to wait for it to upload?

and then after the wait you
Get “ uploading 100%”

then the “ something went wrong
Contract administrator or try again

again and again
Couldn’t upload a screenshot..
Because something went wrong
See less See more
Couldn’t upload a screenshot..
Because something went wrong
That's ironic...
  • Haha
Reactions: 2
When posting a pic
, you can see the pic in your post
Yet you still have to wait for it to upload?

and then after the wait you
Get “ uploading 100%”

then the “ something went wrong
Contract administrator or try again

again and again
Couldn’t upload a screenshot..
Because something went wrong
I will have this looked into. I know we were experiencing an issue on some sites where members were not able to remove their images when they were in the draft or preview option. Going to try to upload a screenshot here

Font Screenshot Display device Darkness Gadget
See less See more
Ok, I was able to grab a screenshot of your post and simply paste it in the response and no issues. Are you able to try that with a screenshot?
421 - 440 of 602 Posts
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top